Bethany says: “Think our justice system sucks? Try these other ones. Here are the top five things used at trial to determine innocence or guilt.”

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5. Trial by Jury: Guilt or innocence is determined by the decision of a jury. This is normal for the US, but some countries, like Japan, do not have jury trials. Gilbert and Sullivan make jury trials much more exciting.

* * *

“OK, so we dunk her, and if she survives it means she’s a witch, so we burn her, right? Wait. Is that how it goes?”

4. Trial by Ordeal: It meant subjecting someone to some kind of almost impossible and/or painful task, with their completion/survival of the task showing their innocence, as only the innocent could receive the necessary help to survive. Some examples of this were trial by water, trial by ingestion (giving them poison), or trial by fire.

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“God’s on my side!” “Impossible. God’s on my side!”

3. Trial by Combat: In this case, might makes right . . . or at least innocence.

* * *

“Yeah, that’s right. I wasn’t speeding. Yeah.”

2. Trial by Declaration: This refers to declaring your innocence of, say, speeding. Something that wouldn’t necessarily go to open court. The judge then reviews the case and makes a judgment.

* * *

“Yeah, we need to look into trial by congress, since we’re not having any.”

1. Trial by Congress: This refers to situations in which the grounds for divorce was impotence. In such a case, if the husband denied he was impotent, then he had to prove the case by having sex with his wife in front of witnesses. Since she was the one who brought the suit to begin with, she presumably didn’t want to have sex with him, and thus would likely be doing whatever she could surreptitiously do to discourage the success of the activity. This brings new meaning to the words “hostile witness” and “performance anxiety”.